


It's Not a Curse, It's a Feature

by anticyclone



Category: Hidden Legacy Series - Ilona Andrews
Genre: Alessandro Sagredo (Mentioned), Case Fic, Curses, Family, Gen, Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 01:21:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18982282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anticyclone/pseuds/anticyclone
Summary: "The bottom line is that curses aren't real," Catalina said. But there's a client in their office with a pendant she swears up and down is cursed. The pendant is pretty… weird… but does that mean it's actually cursed?





	It's Not a Curse, It's a Feature

**Author's Note:**

  * For [burglebezzlement](https://archiveofourown.org/users/burglebezzlement/gifts).



"Why," Catalina said, her voice completely even, "are people on Herald posting that I'm engaged to Alessandro Sagredo?"

Oh shit.

Arabella kept washing out the blender and absolutely refused to raise her head from the sink. She'd completely forgotten about that. She glanced sideways at Grandma Frida, who was sitting at the end of the kitchen table sipping coffee and radiating genuine innocence.

When the silence kept stretching on and there was no pretense left in rinsing soap out of the blender, Arabella carefully set it to dry next to the sink and turned around. She picked up her peach and blueberry smoothie and immediately stuck the straw into her mouth so that when she met her sister's eyes, she wasn't able to speak.

"Can I see?" Grandma Frida asked.

Stone-faced, Catalina turned her laptop around so they could both see it. Arabella almost sucked peach and blueberry smoothie into her lungs.

The first image was a lovingly rendered pencil sketch of Catalina in a wedding dress and Alessandro standing next to her. His tuxedo ended at his ankles, and instead of shoes was text in tiny, cramped handwriting:  _ lol I hate drawing feet.  _ There was also an arrow drawn to where Catalina had her hands clasped behind her back:  _ hands too!! _

Catalina was incandescent. Arabella eyed the kitchen door and decided that, unfortunately, she couldn't actually run that fast.

This had all seemed so simple a week ago.

***

"The bottom line is that curses aren't real," Catalina said.

The way Nevada's face crinkled was not reassuring. The three of them were huddled in the hallway, far enough away from the office that the client wouldn't overhear their conversation. Nevada wasn't even supposed to be working today but had shown up because their fridge had better leftovers (although she'd given a different excuse when she'd walked in an hour ago). And Arabella was supposed to be writing a paper, but it was her friend in the client chair.

"Hexes are, though," Nevada said, after a moment. "I've broken them. A magic cage that kills you if you break its rules? You could call that a curse."

Arabella crossed her arms over her chest. "Hexes are cast on people, though. This is a piece of jewelry."

"A piece of jewelry we haven't even seen," Catalina said. Nevada raised her eyebrows and she explained, "Sadie said her family wouldn't allow her to remove it from the vault, but she could take us to see it, if we accepted the case."

A few steps away, Grandma Frida cleared her throat. Catalina managed not to jump at the sudden approach. She swiveled to face her grandmother, who had a wrench in one hand, a glass of sweet tea in the other, and a concerned expression on her face. "Y'all can't profit off a curse," she said. "What if you get cursed in return?"

"Sadie is really desperate," Arabella argued, because she apparently didn't know what side she was on. She tilted her chin up. "We have to do something. That's why I told her to come here."

"You could have warned me she wanted us to break a curse," Catalina grumbled.

"No, she wants us to prove that a curse exists. That's totally different."

Catalina felt like throwing her hands in the air. "What am I supposed to charge her for curse breaking - excuse me, curse  _ proving?" _

"Nothing! Not if you don't want to get cursed," Grandma Frida said.

"We could just charge her expenses. You know, enough to cover our time," Arabella said. "That wouldn't really be profiting. It'd be breaking even."

Grandma Frida made a face.

"You're forgetting the part where curses aren't real," Catalina cut in, before that tangent could take over the entire conversation. Everyone glanced back at her and she did throw her hands up, now. "How am I supposed to say, yes, we agree to take this case. I have no way of knowing how to complete this task or how to give her evidence that we fulfilled her end of the contract."

This was taking too long. Catalina didn't like leaving clients alone in the office. Not that all of their information wasn't secure, it wasn't that. Leaving somebody alone was unprofessional. It would make an already anxious person even more anxious, and Sadie Hansen had already been incredibly anxious on walking through the door to Baylor Investigative Agency. Turning her away would be difficult, like Arabella said. The woman was clearly desperate. But how could they agree to accept a case when they couldn't agree that it was solvable?

"We should see the necklace," Nevada said.

"It's a pendant," Catalina corrected, reflexively. Sadie had shown her a photo of it on her phone. It was a really beautiful piece. Sadie wanted to dump it in a river but said that her family wouldn't allow her to purchase the pendant just to do that. (Also, Catalina got the impression that Sadie was a little afraid to personally own it.)

Nevada waved her off. "We should see it. If there's something weird about it, one of us should be able to tell. If it's totally normal, we can tell her we're sorry, but we don't think we can help."

"Aren't you supposed to be, like, at home?" Arabella asked. "Because you work all the time?"

Their sister scowled. It was easy to predict what she said next: "Rogan had to go do something and Bug is the only one in the house. Have you seen Bug try to make breakfast? He made a toaster waffle sandwich." Her scowl deepened. "It was three toaster waffles stacked together. He didn't even use syrup."

Catalina's watch beeped, which meant it had been ten minutes. She turned it off and took a deep breath. "I have to go back in. I can't keep Sadie waiting any more. What are we going to do?"

They all exchanged unhappy looks. Grandma Frida muttered something about messing with things you didn't understand and went back to the garage.

After another minute, Catalina went back to the office with both of her sisters in tow.

Sadie Hansen had dark hair piled into a loose twist on the back of her head, with several long strands left loose to curl against her neck. Somehow, she made sturdy black military boots look like they went with her green dress. And she had entered the Baylor Investigative Agency office like she was walking the plank. Her shoulders were rigid, her steps had been mechanical. There seemed to be a permanent line etched between her eyes.

Normally, if someone visited Baylor Investigative Agency looking like this, they spun a story involving people out for them, or a missing family member, or a shattering family secret.

"Hello," Sadie said, scooting to the edge of her chair. She glanced anxiously between them.

Arabella smiled at her, but it didn't make Sadie relax. They knew each other from book club at the local library, which Arabella had started going to in an effort to 'practice debate skills in a non-debate environment.' In the privacy of her own head Catalina had translated that into 'have a normal discussion without antagonizing the other person,' but she would never say that out loud.

"This is our sister Nevada, the head of our agency," Catalina said, gesturing at Nevada, who nodded. "We've reviewed your request together. Can you show her the photo you showed me?"

"Of course." Out came the phone and the photo of the pendant. Nevada leaned over to study it, and Sadie tried not to fidget. "Thank you so much for considering my - my story. I know what I sound like, and I appreciate y'all listening to me."

"We don't think you're crazy," Arabella said, gently. It was slightly more than Catalina would have risked saying, but she had been the one to refer Sadie to the agency.

Sadie gave her a tight smile. She laid her phone down on the desk and clasped her hands together in her lap. Her eyes were damp. "I swear that this piece does - it does  _ something,  _ and people can feel it, and they don't want to buy it. It's cursed. My family is insistent that we need to sell it. But it's gone on display three times, and we've had no offers."

"Is that unusual?" Nevada asked, taking one of the chairs behind the desk. Catalina took the other, and Arabella leaned against the edge of the desk.

"Yes. These are clear topaz, not diamond. They're relatively inexpensive and the cut is unusual." The corners of her mouth turned down. "I thought… I thought that last time, at the gallery display, someone was going to buy it. Then they got into a fight with their partner and both of them left."

Nevada looked at her and Catalina gave a tiny shrug. Sadie was a Significant Harmonizer. So, yes, it was a little unusual for people to be having public fights at an event she had organized.

"When it's in the room, when people are too close to it, it's as if I did no work at all. I am good at my job, I know how to use my magic, and I know that something about this pendant is wrong."

"To be honest," Catalina said, as carefully as she could, "we aren't sure if we can take this case."

Sadie's face crumpled.

Catalina held up one hand. "We're not saying no. We just want to make sure we can fulfill the terms of your request. Is it possible to see the pendant in person?"

"Yes. Yes, of course." Sadie abruptly stood. "Do you want to go now?"

***

Sadie let the three of them in through the back door of Hansen & Company.

It was a forty-minute drive across town. The building had once been a Victorian-style home and looked completely out of place with the architecture on the rest of the block. The siding was robin's egg blue and there was a hand-painted sign on the front sidewalk with the company name and phone number on it. Hansen & Company specialized in antiques, auctions, and estate sales. They had a particular reputation for supplying wedding accessories. (Which would turn out to be trouble in a week, not that Catalina had any idea about that then.)

Catalina expected the inside to be overly kitschy, but it turned out to be fairly subtly decorated. She probably shouldn't have expected anything else from a family made primarily of harmonizers and empaths. The back door lead them into a kitchen break room. Sadie lead them through to a narrow set of back stairs. Catalina went last, glancing at her sisters as they moved past her. Did Sadie not want anybody else to know that they were here?

On the second floor, Sadie stopped in front of a door halfway down the hall.

Nevada's eyebrows went up slightly at the keypad next to the door. She shot Catalina a look, probably because of the model. Catalina didn't recognize it but it did have a fingerprint scanner in addition to a keypad, which was more security than she'd been expecting.

"Just a moment," Sadie told them. She squeezed her hands together and then pressed the pad of her thumb to the scanner. It hummed, beeped, and then Sadie cupped her hand over the keypad and punched in either seven or eight keys, Catalina wasn't sure - they didn't beep as she typed.

The room beyond the door was small, with a long wood-paneled dressing screen hiding one wall and a wooden table at the center. The windows had semi-opaque film on the glass. For some reason there was a pale stone sculpture in the corner. It was made to look like a cave wall and was about Arabella's size. Water ran quietly over tiny outcroppings and pooled in a well at the bottom.

"Please sit," Sadie said. "I'll be out in a moment."

She disappeared behind the dressing screen. Catalina realized there must be safes in that wall. She strained to listen while she took a seat at the table, but couldn't hear anything over the water.

Ah. An organic, peaceful white noise generator.

After a minute Sadie came out with a velvet jewelry box in the palm of one hand. She laid it down in the middle of the table, so everyone could see it, and flipped it open.

Nestled inside was a larger piece of jewelry than Catalina had been expecting from the photo. Instead of a single stone, the pendant was made out of two clear teardrop-shaped gems. Each of them was capped at either end with silver. The bottom gem was linked to the top by several delicate silver links. The top gem had a loop on its crown, clearly meant to be attached to something - a necklace chain, probably. It was beautiful. The gems were cut so that each facet was diamond-shaped. Catalina thought the cut was called briolette.

"Is this being sold with a chain?" Nevada asked.

"No. The owner passed away with no next of kin and no will. We've auctioned off most of her jewelry. This wasn't stored with a chain, and there were no extra chains in her possession - not that would have come close to matching this piece."

"Strange." Nevada settled back in her chair and visibly relaxed, her eyes fixed on the box.

Catalina let out just the tiniest thread of her magic, directed straight at the box. She'd had years to practice at this point and it was nothing to brush against the pendant without letting her magic stretch to anyone else in the room. This was a trick Nevada had taught her: using magic to get some sense of your surroundings. It would react to anything else magical and would simply glide past inanimate objects. If the pendant was simply a pendant, there would be no feedback. Nevada was certainly doing the same thing.

Catalina's magic touched the stones and immediately evaporated. She blinked, then tried again. Same thing. Both times, she had the distinct feeling she had never extended her magic at all.

They all stared at it for a long, silent minute. Something must have shown on their faces, because Arabella was giving them a look.

"Can you hold the pendant for a moment?" Nevada asked.

Sadie blanched, and Nevada opened her mouth, clearly about to take back the request, but Sadie reached forward with both hands before she could speak. She inhaled through parted lips and carefully lifted the pendant into one hand.

"Please tell me a lie," Nevada requested. Catalina wished she'd had a heads up warning to keep her face blank, but at least Sadie hadn't been looking at her.

"The sky is … pink?"

"Something subtle, please," Nevada said, smiling. "Better, tell me one thing that's true and one thing that's not."

Sadie thought for a moment and then said, "When I told my family about this pendant, I expected them to humor me. Instead, all of them rejected my worry outright."

Nevada pressed her lips together. Catalina counted to three before she cleared her throat. "You can put the pendant back now," she said, which Sadie immediately did, closing the velvet case entirely. Nevada looked at her sisters. "Five minutes to discuss?"

Sadie showed them to a sitting room at the back end of the hallway and left them alone.

"What was that?" Arabella demanded.

Nevada crossed her arms over herself, the corners of her mouth downturned. "She never expected her family to take her seriously about this. But it took a moment before I could tell which of the things she said was a lie," she admitted, her voice low.

Arabella jerked back. "Are you sure?"

Nevada sighed. "I'm sure."

"I didn't get any feeling from it at all," Catalina said. "When I tried, it was like I hadn't even attempted to feel it out in the first place."

Several minutes later, Sadie knocked on the door. By then, Catalina had her tablet out, and the contract for the case she'd amended in the car on the way over. The cost would cover their time and any associated expenses (up to a certain limit). Sadie only read the entire thing before signing because Nevada insisted that she had to.

***

A couple of days of experimentation later (and several days before Herald fan artists severely messed up Arabella's morning), no one's feelings about the pendant had gotten any better. Most of them had poked at it by now. Being too close to it delayed Nevada's ability to confirm lies. It made Bern hesitate when he looked at a new puzzle. Leon touched it once and refused to do so again, saying only that it "was super weird." Mom had done the same. Grandma Frida insisted that it had "bad energy" and didn't want it near the garage and her vehicles at all.

Catalina had considered testing it again, with her own magic. An active test this time. It wouldn't have been impossible to find a volunteer. But she'd dismissed that idea almost the instant it came up. True, she was better at controlling her magic, and purging it from people, too. But she said everyone else's tests had been enough.

Which was how Arabella ended up alone in the office, turning the pendant over in her hands, thinking.

All of this was technically conjecture. Or that was what the Hansens would say, anyway. They didn't want to just destroy this piece, not when they'd spent money specifically on trying to unload it. Sadie had said her family would only allow her to get rid of it if she could offer real, concrete  _ proof  _ that it was haunted. Cursed. Whatever.

Arabella tapped her nail against one of the gems. It really was very pretty. Haunted gems usually were, she figured. There was the Hope Diamond. There was … well … that was the only one she could think of.

"Visible proof," she said. She placed the pendant back in its box and stared at it. "Visible … proof."

After a long minute, she got up, stuck the box in her pocket, and walked across the road.

Rogan and Nevada still had an office across from the warehouse. The rest of them all refused to move, so Rogan refused to move many of his people out, either. Of course they were also now Nevada's people. Arabella waved at a few of them as she walked through the open garage directly across the street and up the staircase.

In the office in the back Rogan was working on a pile of paperwork. He had a stack of it in one hand, and a pen in the other, and was reading silently to himself. Perfect. She took the case out of her pocket and opened it.

"Hey," she said. Rogan glanced at her, apparently unsurprised at her appearance, and she raised her hand. "Catch."

He blinked, confused, and the pendant glittered in the air as Arabella chucked it across the room. She really hoped that A) this worked (or… didn't work?) and B) she hadn't just broken the chain connecting the two gems.

The pendant fell short of where Rogan was sitting. She hadn't actually been aiming for his face, that would've been mean. It arced and Arabella's heart jumped when it halted abruptly in midair. A deep scowl took away Rogan's bewildered expression. The pendant rose straight up in the air and turned in a circle, while he frowned at it. The chain was still intact. Arabella let out a breath and sagged against the wall.

Rogan leaned over and reached out for the gems, stopped, and sent the whole thing carefully back through the air to her without touching it. Arabella held both hands out and he dropped it into her palms.

"What the fuck is that?" he demanded.

***

"So I think we can safely say we proved it's cursed."

"Absolutely not."

"But-"

"Arabella," Nevada said, doing her best not to slip into an impression of their mother. "We are not using Rogan as proof."

Arabella opened and shut her mouth and then sat down. She put both elbows on the kitchen table - they were back in the warehouse, now - and scowled at the open blue velvet box. "He said it 'felt slippery.' There's definitely something bad about it." She poked at one of the gems. "Do you think it's the way they cut it?"

Nevada rubbed a hand over her face. "I don't know."

"What's the point of a piece of jewelry that makes somebody hesitate?" Arabella poked the box again. "Are you putting on giant gaudy necklaces while trying to shoot people in the face?"

"It's not gaudy," Catalina protested. Nevada glanced up. She hadn't seen her sister enter the kitchen. Catalina had one hand on her hip and her tablet cradled in her other arm.

She was glaring at the box in a remarkably similar expression to the one Rogan had had on his face when she'd found him and Arabella puzzling over the gems together. Catalina glanced at her and came up to the table, taking the empty chair next to her. She placed her tablet on the tabletop. "It's not gaudy," she repeated. She barely hesitated before picking the pendant up and laying it on her chest. "It's not even that big when it's actually on a person."

Arabella narrowed her eyes. "Oh yeah, nobody's going to notice my secret weapon, the sparkly creepy necklace of weirdness. Just frown at it in confusion while I pull this gun on you."

"It's too old for guns. It would've been swords."

Nevada sat up straighter. "How do you know it's too old for guns?"

Catalina put the gems back into the box. "Sadie sent an email. When Hansen & Company acquired Gianna DiDonato's estate, there was a lot of paperwork." She turned her tablet on and spun it so they could lean in and see the screen. "I asked her to look back through and see if there was anything relating to her jewelry collection."

A scan of an old piece of paper was on the screen. It was a larger-than-life sketch of two teardrop gems cut in briolette style, each tiny facet in the shape of a diamond. The drawing was so oversized that Nevada could pick out little details in the silver crowns on the jewels that she hadn't even noticed while holding the thing in her own hand. There were also some notes, all in Italian, so Nevada couldn't read most them. But in the corner were two names:  _ Proprietà di Giulia Cattaneo. Commissionato da Sofia Proietti. 1894.  _ Nevada knew no Italian but could guess what that meant - the sketch was made for somebody named Giulia Cattaneo on behalf of a client. Giulia must have been an artist working for a jeweler, or maybe a jeweler herself.

She made a thoughtful noise. "Nice work," she said. It was still occasionally remarkable - and a relief - that she was no longer the sole driving force in Baylor Investigative Agency.

"That's not too old for guns," Arabella protested. "They had guns in the 1890s."

Catalina glared at her, and for another moment Nevada wanted to laugh, because they looked just like two kids arguing over a hairbrush. "A woman wearing an expensive piece of jewelry wouldn't have been toting one around. She would've had a sword."

"A lot of fancy ladies were allowed to carry around swords?" Arabella asked. "You're just saying that because you-"

"Did Sadie find anything else?" Nevada interrupted.

Catalina huffed, swiped through a few more documents on her tablet, and then turned it back to face them. "This is Gianna DiDonato's marriage certificate."

Nevada read it, looked up, and saw Arabella's eyes had gotten wide and Catalina looked very thoughtful.

"Her maiden name was Cattaneo," Catalina said. "What I don't get is how she had the pendant. Did Sofia not like it and refuse to buy it? Did she sell it back to Giulia at some point?"

Arabella took the tablet and swiped back through the documents to the sketch of the jewels. She stared at it for a moment and then tapped the screen. "This page is numbered. There was more than one drawing."

Nevada looked back at the velvet box. She reached out and reluctantly picked it up, which she had mostly tried to avoid doing. Rogan had been right. It felt 'slippery,' at least when she examined it with her magic, and she didn't like the feeling at all. But Catalina was also right - when she held the pendant up to her own neck, it didn't seem that large. And Sadie Hansen had said it wasn't that expensive of a piece, given that topaz were cheaper than diamonds.

Why would you make a small necklace that only momentarily disrupted magic?

"What if it was part of a larger piece?" she asked, slowly. Her sisters looked up at her, and she used her free hand to draw a line from the top gem to her throat, and then out to her shoulder. "I had to go to an award ceremony recently. There was an older woman there wearing this giant necklace, with chains that wrapped over her shoulders."

"Chains?" Catalina asked.

Arabella had already Googled  _ shoulder jewelry,  _ though, and was showing them the photos. It was mostly images of pale women in wedding gowns. Delicate chains featured heavily, attached to various gems, making glittering lines across their collarbones. Arabella scrolled through the pictures and stopped at one in particular: a piece with gem-studded shoulder caps, chains in gentle swoops across the woman's front, and a centerpiece of three dripping rubies stretching from her neck to the curve of her breast.

Nevada looked down at the pendant, looked at the image on the screen, and put the gems back into the velvet box. "Multiply that feeling by ten," she told Catalina. "And that hesitation might actually last more than a second."

"Expensive way to make a shield," Catalina said.

Arabella leaned back. "Why would you need a shield at your wedding?" she asked, gesturing at the screen, and all the bride-models.

Catalina clenched her jaw, briefly, and then relaxed her face. It was only for a moment but Nevada still caught it. "If you didn't trust your spouse's magic."

***

"Isn't that my shirt?" Nevada asked, when Arabella climbed out of her car.

"You left it at the house," Arabella said. She dropped her keys into her purse.

Nevada raised her eyebrows. "When, two years ago?"

"Maybe." Arabella grinned. "It looks better on me anyway."

"Y'all," Catalina said. She had beaten both of them here and had been waiting in her car for them to arrive. She shook her head when they looked at her. "Eric is expecting us in five minutes. Let's go."

Arabella inhaled. "Right."

She patted her purse as the three of them turned and walked toward the restaurant. It was a steakhouse that she normally wouldn't have gone to, but Eric Cattaneo had picked it out. It had taken a lot of digging, and a trip to the public library's genealogical research center, but they'd finally shaken out a cousin so distant he hadn't known Gianna DiDonato had died.

Sadie had shown her family the paperwork and they'd reluctantly allowed Arabella to bring the pendant to this meeting. Technically it was the police's job to find next of kin after a death, but it wouldn't reflect well on Hansen & Company to have sold off everything from an estate if there  _ was  _ someone who could lay claim to it after all.

They got inside and the hostess told them Eric was already there. He'd reserved a small event room for the four of them. Arabella trailed behind her sisters while they followed the hostess to the back of the restaurant.

"Eric doesn't have any magic, right?" Catalina murmured.

"Nope. Just a jeweler."

Eric Cattaneo lived in Louisiana. It was still kind of a surprise that he'd wanted to meet in person. When she'd called, Arabella had been planning on proposing a Skype meeting. But he said he could get work done here, and, besides, he wanted to see the pendant in person. The website for Radiant Earth Jewelers said they specialized in custom pieces for 'life's important moments,' which mostly meant weddings. There had been testimonials from names that had turned up as members of Louisiana Houses when Arabella had searched for more info.

He was seated with his back to one of the walls when they reached the back corner of the restaurant. In the photo on Radiant Earth's website, he'd been wearing a suit and standing on the front steps of the shop. Now he was in a t-shirt and jeans, and his forearm crutches were leaning on the wall just behind him. He was in his mid-thirties, two generations younger than Gianna DiDonato had been, with short dark hair and clear-framed glasses.

Arabella darted in front of her sisters and stuck her hand out. "Hi. I'm Arabella Baylor. We spoke on the phone," she said.

He smiled back and returned her handshake. "Eric Cattaneo. Nice to meet you in person."

The hostess left. Nevada and Catalina introduced themselves, and they all sat down. A waiter came and took their drink orders, and then they were alone.

"I'm sorry that we had to deliver the news about your cousin passing," Arabella said.

"I met her a few times as a child, but I didn't really know her," Eric said. "I'm mostly sorry that I didn't think to connect with her when I got older. I think her husband didn't like my grandmother, who knew Gianna best of all my family," he said. He shook his head. "But that's not why you wanted to talk to me."

Nevada cleared her throat. "The company handling your cousin's estate has a particular piece that hasn't sold."

Eric winked at them. He really was very pretty. "The cursed pendant."

"I didn't say that," Arabella said, reflexively, when her sisters looked at her.

"It's a bit of a family legend. My grandmother used to tell me bedtime stories about it." Eric paused when the waiter reappeared with their drinks and waited patiently while they all glanced at the menu for the first time. He left a minute later, and Eric asked, "May I see it?"

Arabella took the blue velvet box out of her purse. She laid it on the table within easy reach and flipped it open.

Eric leaned forward but didn't reach for it. "Oh. It's smaller than I thought it would be."

"What did your grandmother tell you about it?" Catalina asked.

"It was a love story." Eric smiled again. "Well, also how her great-grandparents got enough money to leave the old country. A noble Italian woman asked her great-grandmother to design a piece of jewelry to be worn at her wedding. Pretty gutsy, considering she wasn't even engaged yet."

"Sofia Proietti?"

"Yes. How did you know that?" Eric asked, genuinely surprised. Catalina took her tablet out of her bag and called up the drawing of the topaz gems. He gave it a long look and then let out a breath. "I never would've guessed she also kept any of the sketches. I thought I had all the paperwork that was left."

Arabella shifted her weight. "I can ask Hansen & Company about returning the documents to you."

Eric just stared at the sketch for another moment, then gave himself a slight shake. "We should finish the story before we make any decisions," he said, cryptically. Arabella looked at Nevada and Catalina but neither of them seemed to understand that either. "Sofia Proietti was in love with a man who loved her in return, but said he would never marry."

"That isn't much of a love story," Arabella said.

Eric laughed. "I used to say the same thing. But Sofia was determined, and asked many jewelers in town to work with her on her wedding jewelry. They all turned her down, afraid of offending the man and his family, until my great-great grandmother. Giulia asked to be paid regardless of whether Sofia got her wedding, and Sofia was then desperate enough to agree."

The waiter came back with their food. Arabella wasn't very hungry, but took a bite anyway. The crab she'd ordered was good enough that she regretted ordering it, because she didn't want to be tempted to regularly spend this much money on food.

"Giulia worked very hard on the piece. Sofia was present for much of it. You see, this was just thirty years after the Osiris serum was deployed."

Arabella stopped chewing. Her sisters sat up straighter.

"The man she loved was the first son born to a family who had received it. Back then, not many in Italy had. This was before it was understood magic was very hereditary, you understand. Today, someone like Sofia and her intended would probably not get married." Eric smiled slightly. "Of course, that's my favorite part of the story."

"Sofia had no magic?"

"She did, a minor talent with fortune telling. She was her parent's only child and the skill did not make it to her descendants." Eric took a sip of his water. He hadn't even looked at his food. "Her intended's magic was much stronger than her own."

Nevada said, "So Sofia was right to be confident. They did marry," and Eric nodded. "How does the jewelry play into that?"

"He and his family were convinced Sofia had been swayed by their magic and that her intentions were not true. She set out with my ancestors to make something that…" Eric hesitated, then lowered his voice. "That disrupted magic. So she could say her vows and they would be confident she meant them."

Arabella looked at Catalina. Catalina was silent, her lips pressed together.

Eric pointed at the pendant on the table. "I'm sure you tried testing this out. It's what I would've done in your place. It gives you an eerie feeling, right?"

"It's very… slippery," Nevada confirmed.

"The goal was to prove that his magic couldn't be affecting her at the altar."

"You think they successfully designed a necklace that completely blocked magic?" Catalina asked, the first thing she had said since introducing herself.

Eric spread his hands. "I do. I believe that in general, people's magic talents are stronger today than they were when the serum was first dispensed. So it's entirely possible that back then, it was an effective shield." He paused. "Also, I've seen the rest of the piece, and how people react to it, and it's clear that it does something."

None of them said anything, just stared.

He grinned, and Arabella thought again that he was a very pretty man. He had also probably been planning this moment since they'd hung up the phone yesterday. "Would you like to see it?"

"Yes," Arabella answered for them.

He pulled a hard-shelled gray briefcase off the floor that she hadn't noticed before. Nevada reached over to move his untouched plate out of the way and he laid it down on the table. Eric punched in a combination to the lock on top of the case and flipped it open. Then he turned it around, so they could see the velvet-lined interior and the elaborate web of chains, pearls, and topaz securely laid into it.

It was, after all, a piece of shoulder jewelry.

The chains were studded with irregular pearls and there were two elaborate shoulder caps made of delicate silver vines topped with small, clear topaz. Each of the gems was cut in the same style as the pendant. In the center of the web was a slightly larger chain that dipped down and ended, empty, in the middle of the dark velvet background. There was no hole cut into place to cradle the missing pendant.

It was extremely pretty. It glittered in the light. Arabella wanted to scoot her chair back from the table to get away from it. It seemed … unnatural.

"It took several years after Sofia's wedding for my ancestors to arrange the sale of their land and business, and secure a place to go in the States," Eric said. "In the meantime Sofia's new family asked them to take this with them. They didn't want it used against them in the future, and Sofia was happy, so she agreed to part with it."

"How did the pendant get separated?" Arabella asked, at the same time Catalina asked, her jaw clenched, "What was Sofia's husband's name?"

Eric closed the case again and put it underneath the table. Arabella also closed the little box holding the pendant, which seemed woefully inadequate for transport now. "The way my grandmother told it, my family was increasingly uneasy about having the entire piece together, especially after a Prime client saw it at a viewing and was deeply unnerved by the thing."

Arabella shuddered. How could you get married in that thing? Maybe people's magic really had been weaker back then.

"So when cousin Gianna moved out of state, they gave her part of it. In fact, my mother had only the chains until I received your call. I spent most of yesterday afternoon bugging my uncle to give me the shoulder caps because I wanted to show you the entire thing. Or the entire thing, as we still possessed it." Then he looked at Catalina. "Are you sure you want the answer to your question?"

Catalina tilted her chin up slightly.

"I understand that most people are unaware of the nature of your power, and of course I would never say anything," Eric said. Across the table Nevada was staring intently at him. "But my family still occasionally talks to people in the old country, and, well." He smiled slightly. "Certain gossip does get around."

"I'd like to know for sure," Catalina said.

Eric nodded. "Sofia Proietti was very madly in love with Vitorrio Molpe, at the time, the scion of the newly formed House Molpe."

Arabella had to bite the tip of her tongue to stop herself from saying anything.

"Thank you," Catalina said, sounding anything but grateful.

"What exactly does your client want to do with the pendant?" Eric asked.

Arabella cleared her throat. "Honestly, she would like to throw it into the ocean," she said, which made Eric blink and then laugh so hard he pressed his fist to his mouth. "Her family is more convinced now that there's truly something unworkably bad about it. They may be willing to relinquish the pendant if you could share a small part of your story with them."

"I wouldn't recommend telling them the entire thing," Nevada murmured. She looked unhappy. But she also didn't dispute any part of his story, which meant at least that he believed it was true. "Would it really stand up to the full force of a modern Prime? It's unclear, but I can't think of a good reason to find out."

Catalina said nothing.

"My mother and uncle were not pleased that I wanted to bring the entire piece with me here today. We have a superstition about keeping it all together now, you see," Eric said. "Who does your client want to give the pendant to?"

They glanced at each other. "You are the next of kin," Nevada said, after a moment.

Eric blinked again. "Oh god, no, I don't want it. I was hoping you would take this," he said, gesturing at the briefcase at his feet. "I do love the story, but I wish we had done something about this monstrosity before Gianna moved and we lost contact. My uncle only gave me the shoulder caps if I promised not to bring them back."

"And what should we do with it, throw it into the sea?" Arabella asked.

"No, it might wash up," Eric said, completely serious. He paused. "Topaz can be crushed, though."

***

Rogan was more than happy to help once they explained that the case was closed and the jewelry had really been signed over to Baylor Investigative Agency for disposal purposes.

He used a heavy piece of scrap metal from Grandma Frida's pile, and the four of them stood there watching him methodically destroy each little section of the jewelry. Arabella had tried to argue that the magic was probably all in the topaz and the chains and pearls were fine, and they had stared her down until she'd crossed her arms and shut up.

Catalina put her hands in her pockets and tried not to tense up every time she heard a part of it crack. Maybe it had just been the topaz. Maybe Sofia Proietti had just commissioned a pretty piece of jewelry and had some kind of hex laid over it, one that was so old and degraded that Nevada couldn't sense it anymore. Maybe the original Cattaneo jewelers had their own magic and had done something to it they hadn't told their kids about.

It didn't matter. The only way to be sure was to get rid of the thing entirely. So no saving any pearls or chains just because they were pretty.

Arabella elbowed her and she looked up. "Could you look more angsty?"

"I am not angsty."

"I thought you were over the whole 'my magic is a burden I must bear alone, in the dark, in the rain,' thing," Arabella said.

Catalina tried and failed not to roll her eyes. "I am not brooding, either."

"Y'all," Nevada said, rubbing a hand over her face. "Can we just be glad we finished this?"

In front of them Rogan was busy picking up all the dust he'd made and sending everything into a trash can Grandma Frida was holding. She hadn't said anything, but Catalina had the feeling that she'd wished they'd done this outside. But then someone may have seen and asked what they were up to.

Sadie had ended up paying them just enough to cover their time. Catalina hadn't charged her for any expenses. It had pretty much been the cost of gas driving around and she hadn't felt good about it. She really did just want to put this entire case behind her.

Okay, maybe she was brooding a little.

Not for the first time she wished she'd been able to make any kind of contact with the Molpes, but no matter what she had tried, she'd never gotten anywhere. She'd given up months ago and this had brought it all back. All the frustration, all the creeping dread about what Victoria Tremaine had done to ensure someone like Catalina would be born in the first place.

Rogan finished and took the entire trash can from Grandma Frida. "Be right back," he said. Nevada followed him out of the room.

If her magic was more powerful than Vittorio Molpe's, would someone like Sofia Proietti even entertain the thought of 'proving her love' now? What would it take to make a shield against Catalina's magic? She imagined an entire glittering suit of armor and blanched.

Ugh. She needed to think about something else. She turned her head and saw that Arabella was looking at something on her phone, her expression intense. Catalina leaned over and whispered, "Could you look more angsty?"

Her sister blinked owlishly at her and then jerked her phone up against her chest. "Nope! Nothing here."

"O...kay."

"Gotta go!"

"But dinner-" They were supposed to be ordering in, to celebrate.

"I'll be back, I just have to - do something - in my room," Arabella said, walking backwards. She checked her phone again. "You know what I usually order anyway."

Grandma Frida grumbled. "If it's not an emergency, can you take care of it after dinner?"

Arabella hesitated, then shoved her phone into her pocket. "Yeah, yeah."

***

Anyway, Arabella had totally forgotten to take care of that after dinner. She'd forgotten to take care of it before falling asleep yesterday. And she had forgotten to take care of it this morning, before coming down for breakfast.

So now Catalina was glaring at her like this Herald thread was all her fault.

And it wasn't. It was absolutely not her fault that some Herald fan had seen them meeting with Eric Cattaneo, respected Southern jewelry designer, famous for outfitting Louisiana Houses with custom wedding accessories. It definitely wasn't Arabella’s fault that whoever had originally seen them had jumped to conclusions.

It kind of was her fault for not remembering to ask Bern to shut the thread down last night, though.

Grandma Frida squinted at the screen and scrolled through some more posts. There were a lot of text-only ones, which Arabella's eyes kind of glazed over, but there were also more wedding dress sketches. "You can't actually use any of these sketches without paying them, but hibernation_goals has decent fashion sense. Leaving one shoulder bare would suit you."

"I am not," Catalina said, her voice cold enough to frost over Grandma Frida's coffee, "letting Herald fan artists pick out my wedding dress." Then she paused, and her face flushed. "I am not picking out a wedding dress, period. I am not engaged! And certainly not to Alessandro!"

Arabella opened her mouth and Catalina pointed a finger at her. "Think very carefully before you say anything," she ordered.

Arabella shut her mouth even though she had a valid point. Catalina had never gone on more than a few dates with the same person, and had also never reactivated her Instagram account, and that would lead certain over-romantic fans to speculate why.

Grandma Frida picked sipped her coffee. "I can freeze the thread if you want."

They both looked at her.

"What? I'm a moderator, I have privileges. It's against TOS to post threats to other users, and vindiCATION did say they were going to burn glasses0101's house down for 'crimes against fashion.'"

Silently, Catalina pushed the laptop over to their grandmother. She looked at Arabella while Grandma Frida began to type. They wordlessly agreed not to ask anything about how she ended up with a moderator's account on the Houston sub-forums. It was all in Arabella's tilted head and Catalina's slightly raised eyebrow. Some information was better left unknown.

"Well?" Catalina asked, when the discussion had been frozen and her laptop returned. "Anything to say?"

Arabella sighed. "I guess somebody at the restaurant is on Herald and knew who Eric was. I meant to get Bern to do something about it last night."

"You could have told me," Catalina said.

Grandma Frida huffed. "Bern doesn't have moderator privileges," she grumbled.

"I was trying to make sure you didn't have to see it. I knew it was going to upset you."

"More than being kept in the dark about it?"

Arabella clenched her jaw, then faltered and sighed. "I'm sorry."

"At least it's gone now," Catalina said, turning her laptop off. That was as close to verbal acceptance that she was going to get. "I hate this stuff. I don't get what people are so obsessed about. Just go watch Say Yes to the Dress like everybody else."

"Some of the dresses were nice."

"I'm stealing your smoothie."

"At least Alessandro didn't see them?" Arabella said, yanking her smoothie back just before Catalina's hand could reach it.

The corner of Catalina's eye twitched and suddenly she dove for Arabella's phone, on the kitchen table, which was unlocked and on the home screen. Arabella protested but Catalina called up Instagram without saying anything and typed something in. Then she let out a strangled - well, it was a squeak, or a shriek? maybe shriek - and turned the phone around for them to see.

Some of the fan artists had crossposted to Instagram… and tagged Alessandro in them. It had. Damn. It had a lot of likes.

"Uh," Arabella said.

Grandma Frida winced. "I can't do anything about that."

"I hate everything," Catalina snapped, dropping Arabella's phone. She didn't look any better even when Arabella slid her smoothie across the table. Although she did take it and stick the straw into her mouth.

Arabella checked the post and then Alessandro's account. "At least he didn't  _ comment  _ on it?"

"Please stop saying 'at least,'" Catalina ordered.

Arabella shut her mouth and got up to make another smoothie. She'd warn Nevada about this later.


End file.
